Archive of Our Own ^beta

"Day," A hand is shaking his shoulder, and Kevin grumbles and burrows further into his pillow, trying to get away from the noise. "Kevin. I need your help, Queen, wake up."

Kevin pulls up out of his pillow to glare and Nicky gives him a tight smile. There's a curious lack of any of his usual easy-goingness in his face and a hardness in his eyes Kevin doesn't think he's ever seen before. 

"Practice is in two hours," Kevin snaps at him regardless. "We have to-"

"Fuck practice," Nicky says, voice eerily calm. Kevin thinks this is the closest he's ever come to showing that he's related to Andrew. "For once in your life, Kevin, please care about something else other than Exy."

"It's not that simple!" Kevin shouts back the familiar argument, but not as loud as he could have been. There's something in Nicky's face that says he wants to keep this conversation a secret. "You don't know what's it's like being part of the Ravens-"

"You're not part of them anymore!" Nicky snaps back, then slams his eyes shut and forcibly relaxes himself. He holds a palm out demandingly and Kevin hesitates a moment before sighing and putting his hands into Nicky's. 

Nicky opens his eyes, smiling at the trust, and runs a gentle thumb over the mess of Kevin's left hand and squeezes slightly. "You're not part of them anymore, Queen." He says warmly, and Kevin bites his lip so it doesn't tremble. A full week and he still feels like having a breakdown every time someone calls him that. "You're not a Raven, Riko's gone, Exy does not have to be your entire life anymore."

"The deal-" He starts and Nicky clicks his tongue. 

"Don't give me that bullshit, Day, you know you're the best player in the whole damn world," Nicky says and Kevin tries very hard not to cry. "You're out of that fucking cult, Queen. Live like it."

Kevin manages to only sob once before getting himself under control and nodding. It's nothing he hasn't heard before, from multiple people and in multiple tones, but somehow with Nicky being the most serious he's ever been at three in the fucking morning and still saying it with warm conviction, it sinks in deeper. "You- you're right," He pushes out, ignoring Nicky's raised eyebrows "What's… up?"

Nicky snorts at the awkward question and then suddenly sobers up. "I need your help with something," He says solemnly, the Minyard's shared genes shining through again. "And even if you don't say yes, you can never tell anyone. Not Andrew, not Coach, not even Bee."

He thinks about it for a few moments. It's serious serious, whatever it is, and he's never come across something that even Andrew can't be told. Kevin knows he's probably going to regret it- especially since it's Nicky asking, no matter how scarily serious he currently is- but. But he's now extremely curious and it's Nicky and three am is a good time for bad decisions anyway, so-

"I promise," Kevin says quietly and Nicky exhales. 

"Alright. Luther got out of prison, along with everyone else involved in Andrew's previous cases," Nicky says and Kevin sucks in a sharp breath and grabs at the other's arm, horrified. Nicky nods gravely, eyes serious and steady. "I'm going to go kill them all."

Kevin pulls himself up to a sitting position and thunks his head down onto Nicky's chest. He stays like that for a few moments, absorbing everything. 

"Kevin?" Nicky says, voice cracking a bit to show his usual self, and he sighs in relief. "Kevin, this is giving me the worst anxiety, dude, you have to respond."

"Who is 'everyone'?" He asks hoarsely, buying himself time. Coach hadn’t looked the other way for them for once, shouting at Andrew for not helping in the prosecution of his other tormentors and not stopping even when Andrew started throwing plates at them and screamed insults until his throat was hoarse. But not even Neil had defended him then, so Andrew had gone to court the next day, even though he still refused to talk about it.

Nicky goes tense again. "The rapists. The ones who turned a blind eye. The bitch who kept letting Cass foster kids. Luther and Maria." He lets go of Kevin's hand when he starts gripping too hard, switching to his forearm instead. "They all got off on the grounds that Andrew was a ' psychopath ' and couldn't be trusted, and neither could his 'murderous twin' or 'the butcher's son .'" He spits out each word like it's poison and Kevin feels his jaw clench in shared anger. "And right now, they're all at my house, in one place. And I'm going to kill them."

Kevin raises an eyebrow. "Don't you think you'd be better off asking, I don't know, the people who actually have killed before?"

Nicky flashes a small smile at him. "I can't ask Neil or Aaron without them reporting back to Andrew, and Andrew can't know. It took talking to Neil to understand but-" He breaks off with a sigh, suddenly looking way older than he is, and extremely exhausted. "Andrew will kill anyone who hurts the Foxes, but won't accept anything done on his behalf, no matter how badly they hurt him. Underneath it all, he's just- he's just a stupid kid scared to have anyone care for him . "

"Yeah," Kevin says softly because he's known this all along, patting Nicky's shoulder in an attempt at comfort. "Yeah."

Nicky takes a deep breath and pastes on a smile. "So! That means that my next option is you, Mr. Raised-by-the-yakuza, because hey what's a few more murderers on the team, huh?"

"God, you're fucking insane," Kevin mutters, but doesn't move away. He thinks about Andrew, who’s been protecting him for two years against the literal fucking mafia, who’s always stood by him without a single complaint and killed his mom to protect his brother but still hasn’t so much as spoken out against the doctor who tortured him for two weeks, and feels anger curl in his veins. He hasn’t felt anger on someone else’s behalf in a long time- Evermore Court’s hostility hadn’t raised him to care about anyone else, turning the other way when someone fell prey to Riko’s wrath- but he remembers running up the stairs and seeing Andrew bloody and naked and laughing on the floor, Neil distraught and almost in tears as he covered him in a filthy blanket and clutched him close and Aaron crunching glass under his feet and holding a blood-covered racquet and staring blankly at the dead body on the floor before running to his twin when Andrew practically sobbed out his name and the both of them holding onto each other in middle of the gore and shaking. 

It’s not hard to make up his mind.

“How long do we have?” Kevin says and Nicky smiles with all the violence of the Minyard twins at their worst. 

“We have to leave right now,” He says, moving back and tossing Kevin his brush and a bottle of water. “Luther called ten minutes ago to inform me of the developments and implied they were having a celebration-” He clenches his jaw and closes his eyes to visibly pull himself back under control, “-at my- their house. I don’t want to risk losing this window where they’re all in the same place.”

Kevin nods and pulls out two of Neil’s old ratty shirts from the floorboard he’s ‘hidden’ them in, that the team regularly shred and use for scrap cloth when needed. He throws one over to Nicky, and shakes the last of his sleep off him as they step out into the darkened hallway.

“Alright,” Kevin says. “But we’re taking Matt as well.”

“ What?” Nicky says, looking betrayed. He locks the door quickly and grabs onto Kevin's arms like he's going to run to Matt at that very second. "What, why, no!"

"Nicky," Kevin snaps, "Just because I grew up seeing people get murdered doesn't mean I know exactly how to go about it myself. We need more people, and if we're not going to the experts, we're at least going in numbers. How are you planning on-"

"Shh!" Nicky claps a hand over his mouth, looking around in fear. "I was thinking either a gun or this one poisonous gas they told us about in chemistry class. Oh- fine, what would you rather us do, wise guy?" He crosses his arms in irritation at the look on Kevin's face. 

"Arson," Kevin replies without thinking about it and then grimaces at himself. "It'll be faster and cleaner. But we'll need another pair of hands."

"Ugh," Nicky scowls, but then relents just as quickly. "Fuck. Fine, wait here."

Kevin sighs when he slips into Matt's dorm and leans back against the wall. He's really doing this, huh? 

His gaze slips down to Andrew's room, covered in the stickers he'd trashed after he came off the drugs and rescued by Renee and plastered all over the door. 

Yeah. Yeah, he is. 

"I said Matt, " Kevin tells Nicky irritably when he comes out with a solemn Matt and Dan. "The more people there are, the more chance we have of being caught."

"Do you know how to hotwire a car? No? Then shut up," Dan snaps and Kevin drags his hands down his face. They’re going to get caught. 

“Alright,” Nicky says seriously. “Matt, go get Neil’s old shirts for you two to wear. Dan, find a good car. Kevin, come with me and tell me what we need for arson.”

“Arson?” Matt sighs. “We’ll have to carry bathing equipment for after, then. I’ll get masks too.”

“Good. They deserve to burn,” Dan snarls fiercely, and Kevin sees dried tear tracks on her cheeks. “Every last motherfucker.”

Kevin falls asleep on the way there, waking up with a jolt when the car hits a pothole. 

“-don’t have to do this.” Matt is saying worriedly, with both him and his girlfriend rubbing Nicky’s back as he drives. Kevin bats their hands away and pushes Nicky behind so he can pull his seatbelt, ignoring the glares sent his way. Matt shakes his head and turns back to Nicky. “It wasn’t your fault.”

Nicky laughs hysterically and all three of them wince. “Not my fault?” He demands, seething with a smile on his face. “I am twenty-four years old. I am their guardian, and I’ve been so for five fucking years. And what do I have to show for it? No idea about what their triggers and traumas are, and I drag Andrew to my house for my own selfish desire to make amends with terrible people and not even realize when he’s off meeting his abuser because of my father, and he doesn’t even fucking scream for help when he’s attacked for my sake, and I don’t know how the three of them can stand to be in my presence after I betrayed their trust so badly, and-”

“Nicky, calm down , pull over for a second,” Dan cuts him off, shaking him a bit to get him to stop rambling.

“No,” Nicky snarls, knuckles whitening on the steering wheel. “No, we don’t have time.”

“You’re having a panic attack!” Matt protests, scrambling around in search of water. “Dude, just stop the car!”

“Do you want to crash us all?” Kevin adds, smartly swallowing the Exy-and-Foxes-related comment before Matt decks him for it. “Pull over , Nicky.”

Nicky swears and violently pulls to the side, tires screeching as they stop. He closes his eyes and silently accepts the bottle Matt passes his way, drinking it like he wishes it was alcohol. His hands are trembling. 

“You had no control over any of that, Nicky,” Dan says softly in the silence of the early morning. Nicky slumps, looking away from her. “Nick, come on, how would you have known?”

“They sent their own kid to a fucking conversion camp, why the fuck shouldn’t I have known?” Nicky snaps, shoulders hunching defensively. “You know what- just- just leave it, alright? It is my fault- if I’m old enough to be in charge of children, I’m old enough to make sure they’re safe.”

They don’t have anything to say to that. There’s a weird feeling clenched inside Kevin’s chest, and he can’t think of any words to put to the conviction that Nicky is wrong, but Nicky just passes them gum from the dashboard before restarting the car, and they spend the last ten minutes of the ride in silence.

They pull up past the same movie-esque suburban blue house, parking four doors down. Nicky kills the engine and looks out at the dark shutters of his old house with emotionless, empty, dark, merciless eyes. 

“Nicks?” Matt whispers. “We don’t have to.”

Nicky’s expression cracks, lips pulling to the side in a clear effort to not cry. His entire body heaves in a suppressed sob once, and all of them make aborted movements towards him. Nicky shouldn’t be like this, as torn up as the rest of them. He’s supposed to be happy and carefree and sunshine in spite of everyone trying to get him to be otherwise, proof they can all be happy one day in the future, kind enough to leave behind the life of his dreams to take care of the horrific mess that were the Minyard twins at fifteen and stay for the fuck-up of a team that the Foxes used to be.

Kevin looks helplessly over at Matt and Dan, who look similarly distressed and have no idea what to do either. Even Dan can’t find something to say.

Finally Nicky pulls himself together with a shaky exhale, and his eyes are determined and merciless again when he looks over. “So, how are we doing this?”

Kevin racks his brain for the memory he had of him and Riko tagging along with one of his arsonist cousins to take care of a loose end. “We need to make it look like an accident,” He says slowly, “It’ll look extremely suspicious if they die in a fire immediately after they win the case.”

Dan hums thoughtfully, eyes flickering under the dull yellow of the streetlights. “Electrical fires were pretty common due to faulty wiring a few months before I joined the club. If we somehow trip the electricity and start multiple fires around the place, it can possibly be passed off as an accident.”

“We’re not killing innocents,” Matt says sharply, looking between them all. “No one apart from those assholes is going to get hurt.”

“We can lock them in,” Nicky says softly. “Lock the doors and windows from outside and set the porch on fire so they can’t get out.” Kevin feels a curl of actual fear and dread shoot through him at the lack of emotion on Nicky’s face as he talks about killing his parents and he sees Matt and Dan exchange a worried glance. “Luther and Maria sleep like the dead, and court proceedings should have worn everyone else out, so they shouldn’t notice until it’s too late.”

“And what about the other fires?” Matt says, a flash of motion in the still car as he waves his hands about emphatically. “What if the people in those houses don’t wake up in time?” 

“We’ll keep an eye out,” Dan says slowly after a few moments. “If they don’t get up in time, we’ll… make a loud noise of some sort, to wake them up.”

“An explosion,” Kevin offers, “Do we have any...deodorant?”

All three of them laugh, even though the darkness doesn’t leave their faces. “Do we have deodorant?” Nicky teases. “Do you remember who we are? Does the ocean have water?”

Kevin smiles, happiness burning his chest at making them laugh, and Dan fishes out a bottle from one of their bags with a satisfied grin. “I’ll go trip the generator,” she says, “Kevin and Nicky, go lock up the house, Matt, go hide the car and stake out the houses we’re going to burn.”

“Yes, Captain,” They chorus without thinking about it, and grin. 

Nicky grabs the lighters and gasoline and checks them all once before handing them over to everyone. He exhales once, hand curling over the necklace he always has on and slumping down as if he’s praying and Kevin places a careful hand on his shoulder. Matt and Dan do as well, and Nicky huffs and puts his own palm over theirs.

The necklace is a disaster of a fashion piece- it’s a long thing with trinkets and paper stubs threaded through; pieces of the lives of the people Nicky loves: his father’s gold button, his mother’s earring, a ticket stub of the first match they played together, Erik’s name on a dog tag, Kevin’s favourite poem in a tiny bottle, Renee’s smallest knife, Seth’s little dog figurine, Allison’s signature hairclips, two of Matt’s bottle caps from his collection, an entrance stub for Dan’s club, Neil’s contact lens box, a newspaper clipping of Coach’s first game, one of Abby’s candies, Bee’s old necklace chain holding the whole thing together.

And for the twins, it’s two long fossilized bones from the only time the Minyards had a joint interest in something, a time Nicky regales them with gleefully once every few weeks as being the best time they’d ever had in high school, collecting old bones online and Nicky happily taking them to museums and watching documentaries together without fighting for an entire three months. They’d sold off the stuff when they got bored of it, but Nicky had rescued the pterodactyl femurs that were supposed to be from a fossilized pair of twins to put on the middle of his necklace, and the Minyards complained about it at least once a week.

Nicky clutches them tight as he presses them to his lips, before looking up and smiling worse than Andrew and Neil and Riko and Seth ever have. “Let’s go deliver some karma, folks.”

“Matt, do you have the houses in sight?” Dan’s voice crackles in his ear and Kevin reduces the volume on his phone as he locks the last window. 

“Affirmative, three abandoned and four holiday-empty houses in sight” Matt says cheerfully. “This is such a fun bonding activity. We should get the rest of the Foxes along for the next one.”

“We’ll have to burn at least three houses which do have people, Matt, otherwise it'll be suspicious," Kevin says and Matt groans. "Matt."

"Alright!" He says, "Ten houses, in sight and asleep. Nicky?"

Nicky doesn't reply. "Nicks, are you there?"

Kevin tears himself away and jogs around the house to the shed behind, where Nicky had gone to fetch some more gasoline. Ten minutes ago, now that he thinks about it. 

"He's fine," He tells the others as soon as he walks in, although Nicky doesn't actually look it. "Nicky?" He asks, forcing his voice to be soft as he mutes his end of the call.

Nicky is sitting in the midst of several unpacked boxes with photos and toys and books all scattered around him. Nicky's stuff, Kevin realizes. "Are you… alright?"

Nicky's mouth works soundlessly, tears dripping down his face. He shrugs. 

"Alright," Kevin says carefully. He unmutes the call. "Dan, wait, can we swing the car back around for a few moments?"

"On it," Dan says before Nicky can protest, and Kevin awkwardly crouches down next to him. "Come on, let's pack this shit up."

"I'll do it," Nicky says hoarsely. "You shouldn't be exerting your hand in winter so much."

Kevin graciously does not complain at that, letting Nicky take over it, and instead goes out to pour the gasoline over the porch. 

Nicky joins him ten minutes later, and they do the same around the electric pipelines of the other houses Matt picked out, before meeting Matt in the middle of the street. 

"Alright," Matt says, wringing his hands. "Alright, we're done? Shit. Fuck. Okay, here we go, fire time!"

"Shout any louder and we're gonna get caught ," Kevin hisses at him, anxiety fluttering in his chest like a dying bee. He's pretty sure he's shaking with the adrenaline. "How are we going to do the next part?"

"Do the main house first, to give time for the carbon monoxide poisoning to sink in," Dan says, voice steady and sharp like it always is. "Then do the other houses, and throw the deodorant at the fire around Nicky's house to make sure it finishes the job."

"One problem with that," Matt says. "How the hell do we get away without being seen after we throw the deodorant? People will hear us drive by, even if we book it past at top speed."

"We'll leave a trail towards the cans," Nicky says, voice emotionless again. "Or stack a bunch of wood around them. That should give us time to set the other fires and we'll be able to run past as soon as we hear the explosion."

"Right, good idea," Kevin says, nodding. "No matter how many are done, we sneak away as soon as we hear the blast and pretend we're the neighbours if we stumble into anyone."

"I've cut off the backup generators too, so you don't need to be worried about being seen until people bring the flashlights out," Dan grunts at them, the sound of metal creaking in the background. "Just run fast and you should be good."

"Be ready with the car," Nicky murmurs redundantly. "We'll give you the signal when we're in position."

"Roger," Dan says. 

Kevin exhales and jogs over to the back of the Hemmick's house. He brings out the cans of deodorant from his bag, and Matt and Nicky lug over some firewood from the shed. Kevin arranges it all the best he can, and then steps back before he can second-guess himself and mess it up. 

"We're in place, Dan," Matt says. "Nicky- are you absolutely sure?"

Nicky's staring up at the closed window of the Hemmick's house, where his parents must be. His face is blank, but Kevin can see the anguished conflict in his eyes and swallows against the lump in his throat when he remembers that Nicky loved them enough to try and reconcile even after they sent him to conversion camp and cut him off entirely. 

"They knew," Nicky says quietly. "They knew about Aunt Tilda and did nothing. They knew about Drake and called him over. They deserve everything that's coming to them. Their God can't save them now."

Kevin exchanges a distressed look with Matt, but they both snap back to look at Nicky when he suddenly pulls his necklace off. Kevin's pretty sure he's never seen Nicky without it apart from games and post-showers. 

Nicky removes the button and the earring from the thread, and drops them in the gasoline-soaked grass. He goes to put it back on, then scowls and pulls it back off and violently shifts all the trinkets around so he can remove the twin pterosaur bones. 

"None of this would have happened," Nicky hisses, glaring at the fossils, "If I had just listened to them . "

"Wait, whoa," Matt says hurriedly, grabbing Nicky's hand as he goes to throw them into the grass as well. "Come on, man, don't do that, you three love those bones! You never shut up about it! Dinosaur bone summer, remember?"

Nicky scoffs. "They tell me to get rid of them once a week." Kevin and Matt wince in unison, and Nicky wrenches his hand away and drops the bones next to the jewelry in the grass, close enough to the nearby garbage bags that it won't be suspicious enough for the police to investigate, even if Kevin is pretty sure bones don't burn easily. 

Nicky exhales and puts his phone to his ear. "Cut the power, Dan."

"Done," Dan says, and the world goes dark. Kevin exhales and grabs Matt's arm as his eyes adjust to the wan moonlight, and Matt rubs his hand soothingly. They all know about his aversion to the dark. 

There's a slight rustle in front of him and they all step off the lawn Nicky pulls out the lighter. 

"See you in hell," He whispers, and flicks on the lighter and drops the flame to the ground. 

The three of them watch as the fire catches and then silently turn in unison to run away. But ten steps away, the miserable, conflicted, anxious mess in Kevin's chest wins out and he skids to a stop and turns back around and grabs a stick from the ground as he rushes up to the porch. 

The gasoline is still catching fire, spreading quicker by the second, but Kevin manages to reach the garbage bags in time and hits the bones with the stick clear out of the way of the fire. 

Except this isn't an Exy field and the bones get caught in the grass, and get caught in the fire a second later. Kevin slumps in disappointment, already cringing at the white going an ugly grey, but almost immediately another stick bats them onto the stone sidewalk, safe, and Matt nods at him approvingly. 

Kevin grins back, the fire next to him lighting up the adrenaline in his veins to exhilaration, and he scoops up the charred, blackened bones and dumps them in his pocket as they both run to the other houses. 

He spends the next ten minutes finding out why exactly people commit arson. 

There really is nothing like it. He has one of his lighters they’d bought at a market after their first match- he doesn’t smoke, only bought it for the gold raven with an arrow through its heart embossed on both sides of the sleek blackness, now something he brings to games for luck. It clicks smoothly each time as he opens it, the orange-yellow-blue heat silent until it touches a leaf or paper, crackling away loud enough to wake the dead in the cold morning air. The flame curls the edges of the flint up and licks away at it until it goes black, falling to the ground as ash. Kevin watches each one burn, the only light in the darkened suburb, and lets half of it turn to dust before dropping it to the petrol below and breathing in the smoke and the smell as the fire dances up in front of him. 

He practically flies between each house, laughter in his chest and fire in his veins and feels the sheer happiness that usually comes only with- no. He’s never felt this way, not even on the Exy court, never felt the complete freedom that comes with the joy and the chaos and the fire. 

He almost forgets what he’s here for, and is caught completely off guard by the loud explosion behind him, the blast of heat almost knocking him off his feet. He turns, and the Hemmick’s entire house is up in flames, the back half of it missing, the flammability of the deodorant apparently more than they had anticipated. 

Kevin stares for a second, then gasps as the ringing in his ears stops and reality seeps back in with the sound of screams, and he books it as fast as he can. 

He can see lights come on, but manages to reach the end of the block before the first door opens. He stops when a flashlight shines in his direction, then instinctively points and screams, “FIRE!” 

The man holding the torch looks over and swears, and Kevin runs back towards the fire as slow as he can, then turns back once the man passes him, and goes around the house, where the backyard is still drenched in darkness.

He runs all the way to the car, and nearly sobs in relief when one- two- three heads poke out and shout and beckon him over. Kevin yanks open the passenger door and throws himself inside, and Matt slams the door shut for him and Dan floors it out of there. 

“Fuck’s sake, Kevin, couldn’t you have come faster?” Dan snaps at him and Kevin only doesn’t snap because Nicky lets out an inhuman sound from the backseat. He’s staring out the window, looking down from the freeway at the sight of his childhood home on fire, his parents undoubtedly dead inside. He gasps like no air is making it inside his lungs and all three of them call out his name in unison.

“Nicky, Nicky, breathe,” Matt says, and Kevin pushes himself up and clambers over the boxes and falls into the backseat, muttering, “Put your seatbelt on,” to Dan as he goes.

“Oh God, oh fuck,” Nicky says, putting his head in his hands, “Lord Jesus, you chose to be called the friend of sinners, by your saving death and resurrection free me from my sins. May your peace take root in my heart and bring forth a harvest of love, holiness, and truth- don’t stop FUCKING DRIVING!”

“Fucking hell, Nicky,” Dan says hoarsely, but speeds back up.

Nicky’s breathing quickens again and Kevin grabs him and pulls him close into a fierce hug before he can start praying again, unable to take it. “Nicky, it’s alright,” he mutters helplessly into the other’s hair. “It’s alright.”

Nicky laughs hysterically, sounding insane as they fly down the empty cold freeway, the sky lightning above their heads, stars disappearing. He goes on and on laughing and the tears spill over Kevin’s cheeks with Nicky’s, and Matt sobs and joins the hug, and Dan’s wet eyes stare at them through the rearview mirror with the clear want to be with them in their grief as she keeps them moving.

“Nicky, listen to me,” Matt snarls, grabbing his arms and cutting off the guilty, frenzied babbling that had made Kevin bury his head into Nicky’s shoulder in an effort to drown it out. “Nicky, you’re not the sinner here. They all had it coming, alright?”

“But-” Nicky sobs helplessly, going limp in their grasp.

“We’re all murderers,” Dan says from the front seat, with the inimitable tone in her voice that makes them all listen to her. “We all helped, Nicky, we’ll be right next to you in hell.”

“Fuck that,” Kevin snaps. “We’ve been through too much shit for God to not give us a free pass to heaven. They were rapists, they hurt Andrew and Aaron, they deserved it, Nicky. One of you is worth a hundred of them.”

Nicky laughs, but it’s tearfully genuine, not crazed anymore. “Not exactly how it works, Queen,” He says, smiling up at him, and accepts the water bottle passed to him. He closes his eyes. “Fuck.”

“Yeah,” Matt says, “Fuck.”

“I think I lost ten years off my life doing that,” Nicky says with forced evenness. “It was so stressful.”

“Really?” Kevin says in surprise when Matt agrees, “I had the time of my- I didn’t think the fire part was that bad.”

“Of course you don’t,” Nicky says, sounding amused, understanding what Kevin means even though it very much sounded like he enjoyed killing Nicky’s parents. “Of course you’re an arsonist at heart. Tell me, Exy or fire?”

Kevin opens his mouth to say the obvious answer, then looks at the fragileness in Nicky’s eyes and shrugs, “Fire. Barely.”

“WHAT?” Nicky pulls away to stare at him in shock, a disbelieving grin pulling at one end of his lips. “Kevin. Kevin. Seriously?”

“There’s less pressure, that’s the only reason,” Kevin says, years of conditioning breaking the streak of bravery, shifting in discomfort but not looking away from Nicky’s delighted expression. “I liked- the predictability that it was unpredictable, the flames, the rush. It was fun.”

Nicky lets out a wordless shout of joy and leaps forward to crush Kevin to his chest. “ARE YOU GUYS HEARING THIS?” He yells straight into Kevin’s ear. “QUEEN’S FINALLY FREE, BABY! HE’S FOUND A PASSION OTHER THAN EXY! Granted, I kinda do wish it hadn’t been arson,” He moves back and cringes, “But! Congratulations! We’re going to find so many things for you to burn!”

“Better keep the younger one away from fire as well,” Dan says, taking a swig of an energy drink Matt cracked open. “We already get into so much shit, we don’t need two pyromaniacs on the team to add to it.”

Younger- oh, Neil. Matt grimaces, shivering at the very idea and says empathetically, “I can see that for him horrifyingly easily. Keep all fire away from Neil, please.”

“Do you think that counts as prejudice against redheads?” Nicky asks cheerfully. 

“No, because I wouldn’t trust Allison with a lighter, either,” Dan says, “Are you okay, Nicks?”

Nicky flashes a fake smile at her. “I decided I’m going to save my tears for tomorrow when the police break the news to us,” He says, “No, no- don’t try to convince me otherwise, because if I start crying I’m not going to stop for a long time and it’ll be extremely suspicious if I wake up from my beauty sleep with red eyes.”

Kevin looks at Matt, who shrugs helplessly and sighs before pulling them both over to cushion Nicky between them as they speed away. 

It’s around five in the morning when they reach the dorms, having stopped midway to wash themselves off in the woods and trash Neil’s shirts, pulling up to the parking lot silently. Kevin has a headache, and Columbia and the fires feel a million miles and a lifetime away in the early morning light. The only proof he has that it happened is the tear tracks on their cheeks, Nicky’s childhood packed in boxes, and a missing crate of deodorant cans.

"Nicky?" Dan says as they get out, immediately pulling him into a tight hug. “You’re a good person. We’re all good people. Remember that.”

Nicky sobs in her embrace and he nods. Kevin grabs his hand as he walks past and leans on his shoulder as they walk into the dorms. Nicky huffs and slings an arm around his waist in return, and Kevin keeps himself pressed to the other’s body right up till they reach the door, squeezing his hand in a meagre attempt to show him some of the emotions he can’t put a name to, the love he can’t bring himself to express, and Nicky smiles like he understands.

Kevin stuffs the charred bones into an old sock and pops a sweet into his mouth before collapsing onto the bed and immediately falling asleep.

“Are you dying?” Neil half-yells in panic straight into Kevin’s face half an hour later, ignoring the shout and the instinctive half-punch Kevin throws his way in alarm. “Why are you still in bed? Did practice get cancelled? How come you didn't wake us up to go train anyway?”

"Josten, shut up, " Kevin groans, falling back onto his pillow and blinking in confusion when two palms fall on his forehead. 

He narrows his eyes unimpressedly up at the twins, switching to a glare when Aaron says something in mock concern in German to his brother and Andrew nods gravely. "Go away," He tells them, and turns back around in his bed. "I just fell asleep like twenty minutes ago, go ask Coach to cancel practice. I don't feel like playing."

Neil lets out a strangled sound that people make when they're shot, and Kevin throws a cushion at Aaron when he digs out a cross from somewhere to shove in his face and start conducting an exorcism. 

"Did you go out somewhere?" Andrew says sharply- as uncomfortable with their new partial separation as Kevin is - and Kevin winces into his pillow. 

He pushes himself up and turns around slowly to meet the three pairs of sharp ice-blue eyes, and sighs. 

"Nicky got a call from the lawyer at about three in the morning," Kevin says haltingly, wishing he didn't have to say it for the ruse to be realistic. "We lost the case."

All three of them go still, relaxed expressions going blank immediately. Neil glances between them, arms twitching as if he wants to comfort them, but Aaron steps away and Andrew shakes his head sharply and he retreats. 

"On what grounds?" Andrew says quietly. 

Kevin winces internally, but hopefully his expression is as closed off as theirs on the outside. "I don't know. Nicky didn't tell me."

"It was because of the juvie and the drugs, wasn't it?" Aaron snarls just as quietly. "The court didn't take us seriously."

"I said Nicky didn't tell me ," Kevin lies angrily. "He didn't say anything, he was having a breakdown all the way from three to five-thirty, and we couldn't get anything out of him."

The twins shut their mouths where they had opened them to yell when he gets to the end of his sentence, and Neil cringes and looks in the direction of Nicky's room. 

"We?" Andrew asks. 

"Matt, Dan and me," Kevin replies, rubbing his eyes to get them to focus. "He was- having a bad time. A really bad time."

"Oh, so he wakes up Boyd and you and Dan when he's going through shit, but not his own cousins," Aaron says bitterly, which is when Kevin realizes his mistake. "So much for family."

Andrew grinds his teeth and reaches for his cigarette packet, kicking Kevin's bedside drawer when his hand comes up empty. Allison must have stolen it again. "After all we’ve been through, he still doesn’t fucking think us reliable enough to share the details of this fucked up case,” He growls, “And to think I thought he trusted us.”

“Nicky loves you,” Neil says firmly, which Kevin is endlessly grateful for because he was busy remembering Nicky’s new resolution to trust the twins more and throwing the bones into the fire and panicking at the fuck-up to say something. He’s going to personally go to god in the afterlife and thank them for sending them Neil. “It’s a difficult position for him, because his parents are the reason you both got hurt, and it’s probably hard for him to reconcile his childhood memories with the monsters they are.”

“They shipped him off to conversion camp, how great can they have fucking been?” Aaron snaps. “Shut up, Neil.”

“Hey!” Andrew barks protectively, glaring until the barest hint of hurt flashes across Aaron’s face. Andrew sighs. “Shut up, Neil.”

Neil rolls his eyes and Kevin finally finds the words to speak up. “Nicky didn’t wake you up because there was no point doing so only to tell you bad news. He’s not that kind of person. And he wasn’t breaking down over his parents for fuck’s sake, he was crying over you the fact that you both had been through so much but still aren’t receiving justice. He was crying for you, and the fact that he only made things worse instead of being the one person in your lives that you could trust to keep you safe.”

The room is silent when he finishes talking. The twins are both looking away from him, complicated expressions on their faces. “We already trust him,” Aaron says finally, no heat in his voice, sounding the slightest bit choked up, “He’s already done enough.”

“He thinks it’s his fault regardless,” Kevin says, and watches the Minyards both deflate, worry taking up residence with the rest of the emotions on their faces. “Because he made you both come with him to his house.”

“How the fuck would he have known?” Neil says, frowning. “None of us could have known.” Kevin shrugs helplessly.

Andrew collapses onto Kevin’s legs, leaning back against the wall with a sigh. His voice is defeated when he speaks, like Kevin has never heard it be before and his heart hurts for his friend. “I told you all,” he says to the top of the bunk bed. “That we shouldn’t have opened the case again. We never would have won.”

“Oh, will you fucking shut up?” Aaron snarls venomously, dropping down next to Andrew and glaring. “If it was someone else going through this shit, like Renee or Bee, you would have fought tooth and nail to get them revenge. It’s only because it’s yourself that, what, you don’t give two fucks?”

“It was years ago,” Andrew says quietly. “It doesn’t fucking matter anymore.”

“Of course it matters!” Aaron shouts, “Do you think caring for someone is a one-way street? Do you think I’m not as much your fucking brother as you are mine, no matter how much you want us not to be?”

“Of course we’re brothers,” Andrew says even more softly. His face is still closed off, but Kevin knows there’s a maelstrom of emotions under the mask. “Aaron, I was wrong back then, I told you-”

“Well, you don’t let me fucking act like it, do you?” Aaron’s voice cracks, eyes filling with tears. “You killed Mom because she hurt me, but you wouldn’t so much as look at me during the trial after I killed Drake.”

“I was trying to make it easier for you,” Andrew whispers. Kevin half-hysterically thinks that the therapy sessions are working wonders and doesn’t dare to breathe. “I didn’t want you to get in trouble on my behalf. Plus, killing isn’t easy, and I made you-”

“You didn’t make me do anything,” Aaron snaps. “I don’t regret killing that fucker, and I’d do it again if I had to.”

“Aaron-” Andrew chokes out, but Aaron barrels on.

“If there was even the slightest bit of chance that we could implicate all those bastards who hurt you, we were always going to take it. Why can’t you-” He visibly struggles for a moment, Andrew staring at him silently. “Why can’t you let us protect you? ” He bursts out finally, desperate and savage and protective and Neil and Kevin grab each other's hands in shock when Andrew’s mouth falls open soundlessly and a single tear tracks down his face.

Aaron’s eyes widen at the sight of it and he makes an aborted movement forward before visibly stopping himself and swallowing. He glances at Neil and then says softly, “Yes or no?”

Andrew shudders and nods and Aaron throws himself onto his brother, pulling him into a fierce hug. Kevin can feel Andrew trembling, even as he slowly lifts one hand to reciprocate, delicately curling it around Aaron’s waist.

“I’m your brother,” Aaron says and Andrew gives a short gasp, shaking wildly. “I’m going to protect you too, okay? We’ll get back at those bastards. The Foxes will make them pay.”

There’s a moment of tension where they all wait for Andrew to react, Kevin and Neil clutching each other with both hands, frozen in place, and Aaron pulls back to look at him. And then Andrew nods and Aaron pulls him closer to hug him harder, Andrew melting under the strength of his grip. 

Neil and Kevin sigh in relief, still holding onto each other hard enough to bruise, and Kevin pulls until Neil leans down onto him, tipping his head onto Kevin's until his entire vision is obscured by auburn curls. Even though Kevin kind of wishes they didn't have this whole conversation while sitting on his legs and his heart hurts when Andrew lets out a barely audible sob and clutches onto his brother like he had in Nicky's house, letting himself fall to pieces for the first time in years, he still is overjoyed enough by them getting along and being able to express their love through something other than murder that he squeezes Neil's hands tight and smiles up at him. 

Neil grins breathlessly back, crying as well. Their smiles disappear fast, as Andrew involuntarily becomes louder, breath hitching in heartbreaking sobs, and Kevin has to hold Neil back from stepping in. This moment should be just for the brothers, no matter how devastatingly longing Neil looks as he stares at Andrew’s shaking back. 

Andrew eventually pulls himself together with a loud shuddering gasp, and Aaron whispers something to him as he rubs his back. Andrew mutters something back and they both huff out a laugh. Kevin privately wonders how much of a menace they’re going to be when they finally get along without fighting for more than two hours. 

Andrew hugs Aaron once hard enough that his brother chokes a bit, burying his face into his shirt, before slowly moving away. He looks over his shoulder at Kevin and Neil, eyes vulnerable and fragile, steel walls down for a moment, jerking his head towards himself questioningly. 

Kevin wants to hug him, but he can tell by Andrew’s posture that he’s pushing himself for it for their sake, so he shrugs and holds his and Neil's entwined hands out, giving him a half-smile. “Eh. We’ll cash it in later.”

Andrew slumps and half-smiles back, placing one of his hands over theirs and squeezing, and Kevin sighs in relief at making the right call for once. Neil leans more heavily onto him and Aaron puts his head down on Andrew’s shoulder.

They stay like that for a while, silent, which is amazing news for Kevin’s body begging him for sleep, and the assholes all laugh at him when he jerks his head up after he falls too far ahead in his half-sleep state. He scowls at them playfully, and the Minyards smirk at him- oh look, they are fucking related after all, everyone’s fucked- and he kicks them off the bed.

Aaron is still standing closer than normal to Andrew when they finish their impromptu shoving match a few minutes later and Kevin nods at Aaron in understanding. Aaron nods back gravely.

“Hi Coach!” Neil says cheerfully beside them, “Kevin asked if we could cancel practice. No, he’s fine, we checked.” Kevin hits him and Neil cackles under his breath and shoves him back. “Yeah, come to the dorm in half an hour, we-” His face goes sober suddenly. “We have news. Bring Betsy and Abby.”

“What time did you all sleep?” Andrew asks, stealing Kevin’s ice tea from his mini-fridge.

“Twenty minutes ago,” Kevin replies, then quickly, “Don’t wake him up.”

“We won’t,” Aaron rolls his eyes as he and Andrew walk out towards Nicky’s room. “I’ll tell the others that practice is cancelled and Kevin isn’t dead. Catch some sleep, it’s going to be a bad day.”

Neil jumps up and murmurs something in German to Andrew that makes him soften and Aaron gag, before pecking his cheek carefully and backing away. Andrew rolls his eyes, the slightest of blushes staining the bridge of his nose, and grabs his brother’s hand as they walk out and shut the door.

Kevin sighs and then catches sight of Neil’s shit-eating grin and groans. “Don’t you fucking dare,” he threatens, but he knows it’s a useless endeavour even as Neil takes a running leap towards him and lands straight onto Kevin with all thousand pounds of his stupid bony runner’s body, shifting Kevin’s organs to positions they’ve never been before. “FUCK! NEIL!”

Neil cackles his mad dolphin-witch-chicken hybrid laugh, and Kevin is too happy to hear it, just as happy as they all had been when they’d first heard it, to give Neil the proper retaliation he deserved for that stunt he just pulled, instead settling for a chokehold and good old-fashioned tickling, using his height to his advantage until Neil cries mercy, breathless from laughter.

Neil sighs, relaxing into the bed, bodies jammed up together. The sun is rising outside, and Kevin suddenly realizes he’s never been awake at this time to enjoy it, either busy practicing or sleeping. He stares at the dust particles catching sunlight in the morning air, the heat warming up their skin to the perfect temperature. He wonders if the reason he loves it so much, the reason he looked into the fire three hours ago and laughed and felt like he was tasting freedom for the first time was because of Evermore, because of all the darkness he grew up in. 

You deserve to have what you want now, Kevin, Bee had told him once. He reaches a hand out and dips it in the sunbeam, watching his skin and scars turn golden. Neil curls into his side with a happy hum, and Kevin slings the other hand around him as they watch the sunlight pool into the room and warm them up. It’s nice. Freeing. 

“We’re free,” Kevin whispers. Neil hums and nuzzles in closer. 

“We are,” He replies.

They fall asleep, warm.

Kevin is surprised that he manages to get an hour and a half more in. They’re woken up by Dad slamming the door open and Neil jerking awake and slamming a hand straight into Kevin’s face in panic.

“Sorry,” he says once he realizes where he is and Kevin grunts sleepily at him in acknowledgement.

“What’s happened?” Coach says, face frozen in worry and already ready to hear the worst. “Are you both broken? You two skipped exy practice?”

“We lost the case,” Kevin mumbles and Wymack stares at him for a second before sighing and slumping down. “Nicky got the call at three in the morning and panicked till like five-thirty. I was up till then.”

“Shit,” Dad sighs, pushing his hair back and looking into the distance, “Do the twins know?”

Kevin and Neil nod in unison and Wymack curses again. “Get up and get dressed in ten. We’re having a meeting in the common room.”

Kevin delays as much as possible, succeeding in not being there for the immediate reaction to the news. He somehow is always present and always gets caught up in everyone's emotional outbursts for some reason, so he has to take his wins where he'll get them. 

There's angry shouting and cursing and a bottle breaking when he walks in, and even knowing that all the bastards are dead doesn't help any when he sees the look on everyone's faces. 

"Shit," Matt is saying, tugging on his dreads. He's a good actor. " Fuck. What are we going to do?"

"We can appeal to a higher court, obviously," Renee says, arms crossed and leaning against the locked door. "We're not going to let this shit stand."

"That requires funds," Dad sighs. He raises a hand against the betrayed, disgusted expressions turned his way. "Not that I'm saying we won't go through with it, it's just that stuff will be tight for a while."

"And no, Neil and Allison," Abby interrupts before they can speak up. "You're not using up the last of your funds, you need to invest those if you want some form of stability. I said no ." She says louder when they both look like they're going to protest and Kevin grimaces. 

"Don't," Andrew says and Neil and Allison lose the bull-headed stubborn expression to look at him in shock. He and Aaron are sitting together on the sofa, Nicky sitting at their feet and staring at the ground in silence, a million miles away. “We don’t need to make such a fuss.”

“Shut up, Andrew,” Multiple people call out a variation of, Aaron being the loudest and Andrew’s face twitches with anger for a moment. 

His voice is sharper when he speaks again. “If they used the drugs and juvie argument against us the first time, they can use it in the higher court too. The whole thing will just end up being a waste of the team’s money.”

“Shut the fuck up, Andrew,” Nicky says, voice blank but firm. Everyone goes silent immediately and turns to look at him, but he doesn’t look up, staring at the floorboards and not moving. “Shut the fuck up.”

Andrew’s expression flickers for a moment, worry warring with irritation, before the latter wins out and he goes for the jugular. “Your parents are the ones going to jail if we win the case. Is that what you want, Nicholas? For you to be responsible for putting your own family behind bars? I’m sure there’s a Bible verse against that.”

Kevin winces as Nicky’s eyes flicker back to awareness at that, hands curling into fists. He turns around so fast no one has time to register it and curls a fist in Andrew’s shirt and pulls him down to face him.

“You’re my family, not them,” Nicky snarls violently, angrier than any of them have ever seen him, unflinching even when Andrew instinctively goes for his knives and presses one against his skin. Nicky doesn’t spare a glance towards it, instead reaching out and curling his other first into Aaron’s shirt and dragging him closer so he can glare at both of them at the same time. “Andrew and Aaron Minyard, you are my family, not those bastards, understand? I don’t give a flying fuck what I have to do to get it, but I’m going to make sure every last of those fuckers who hurt the two of you rot in jail for the rest of their miserable , pathetic lives.”

Aaron and Andrew stare at him with their mouths open and eyes wide and glistening, and Kevin can feel it, feel the last dislocated bone of their fucked-up family about to slot into place as they both make to say something, and has to fight not to curse when there’s a heavy knock on the door and gruff voice says, “Police, open up.”

Everyone goes tense- except Neil who goes scarily relaxed instead- and Dan shoots him a pointed look. Kevin nods and goes to get the door. It’s easier for everyone involved for him to be the one to talk to the police, and he can see the pigs lose some of their aggression as soon as he flashes a smile at them.

“Is this the Foxes Exy team?” The officer asks, and everyone nods silently. “Can you all tell me where you were at around four this morning?”

“In our dorms, officer,” Kevin replies, sounding puzzled. Behind him, the rest of them make vague noises of agreement. “Exy practice starts at six, which means we all sleep by eleven for peak performance. At four we’re all dead asleep. Thunderstorms couldn’t wake us.”

“The entire time?” Another officer stresses, glaring around like he’s already made up his mind about them. “Do you have proof?”

“Really, man,” Dad steps in, sounding exasperated. “Who’s going to have proof of kids sleeping in their beds? What’s happened?”

The officers exchange a look. “Nicky Hemmick?” The first one asks.

“Here,” Nicky says, jumping to his feet. “Yes?”

“Did you get a call regarding the case you are building against your parents and a few others, at around three am last night?”

“Yes,” Nicky replies in clipped tones, stiff. “We lost. We were just meeting up to talk about it.”

“And then immediately after, that happens?” The second officer demands of his partner, “With the history this pack of delinquents have? They must have done something.”

“The electrical company has declared it an accident, Rogers,” The first officer says tiredly. Kevin’s heart skips a beat and the fear he hadn’t even realized was icing his veins melts away. “And multiple houses got caught up in it, not just one. This is just a formality. Back off.”

One of the misguided semi-good cops then. Kevin makes a note of his name for next time. 

“What?” Nicky says, a hint of distress creeping into his voice. “What are you talking about? What happened?”

The first officer grimaces sympathetically. “I’m sorry, Mr. Hemmick, but there was an electrical fire at the Venitem suburbs last night and multiple houses caught fire. Your parents’ home was one of them, and they and all the people involved in the case happened to be in the home at the time and perished in the flames. My condolences.”

Kevin looks at Nicky, watching as emotions flash over his face one after the other. He finally falls on unwilling grief, closing his eyes on the tears that fall out, body trembling. 

“Nicky?” Bee steps up on his other side, placing a hand on his shoulder, and Kevin reaches out and curls his fingers around Nicky’s wrist. Nicky opens his eyes and takes a shuddering breath, straightening up and pulling himself together. 

“Thank you for informing me, officers,” Nicky says steadily. “I’m assuming you’ll require me for the legal processes now?”

The first officer nods solemnly. “Alright,” Nicky says, “Give me five minutes and I’ll be down there with you.”

The door shuts and the footsteps echo down the hall, the ding of the elevator shutting rings out. Kevin squeezes Nicky’s wrist and Bee rubs his shoulders soothingly as Nicky starts trembling. He’s making a noise that Kevin takes a moment to realize is laughter, low and hysterical.

“Talk about karma!” He says, voice thick. “Talk about getting what you fucking deserve. What are the fucking odds, huh?”

“They were still your parents,” Dad sighs, walking over and pulling Nicky into a hug. “Jail and death aren’t the same thing.”

Nicky doesn’t move to reciprocate, staying stiff even as the others come up to hug him as well. He stands there for a few moments when everyone is done, then suddenly brushes past them to where his cousins are still sitting on the couch, frozen with the emotional whiplash of the whole thing. He leans down and pulls them into a tight hug.

“I meant it,” Nicky tells them simply, then moves past them all and is gone in seconds.

Kevin can see the suspicion flicker over Neil, Allison and Renee’s faces at his uncharacteristic behavior and he thinks fast. “Someone should accompany Nicky.” They all turn to him when he speaks up, “It's not going to be easy for him. Plus, the cops may turn against him too”

There’s practically a stampede to get out and follow Nicky, and in seconds, only the twins, Abby, Bee, Kevin and his dad are in the room.

Bee walks over to the sofa, heels clicking slowly over the wooden floor. “Are you alright?” She asks softly and Aaron laughs scathingly.

“They’re dead,” Andrew says numbly. “Cass, Ben, Henry, all of them. They’re all dead.”

“Sure are,” Kevin says quietly and Andrew looks up and meets his gaze, eyes slowly coming alive. “Sure, we didn’t personally get to do it, but we won, Andrew. We fucking won.”

Andrew smiles then, a wide genuine one, in a way he hasn’t since he’s come off his drugs and Aaron laughs happily and knocks their shoulders together. The adults smile with them, too familiar with the whole story to be anything other than glad. Kevin grins and enjoys the jubilation, smiling as they laugh.

It lasts a good ten minutes before Andrew’s smile fades. “Nicky’s parents,” he says, “Fuck.”

“We should have gone with him,” Aaron says, wincing, looking at the clock. “Maybe we can still catch up?”

“No,” Kevin blurts out. “No, that second cop had it out for you guys. Best stay at home.”

“And what the fuck are we supposed to do while we wait for our cousin and the whole fucking team to finish inspecting his parents’ charred bodies?” Andrew snaps. 

“Exy?” Kevin says. The twins stare at him with their mouths open and he shifts awkwardly in the silence, wondering if his tone had come off too deadpan. “That- that was a joke. I was joking.”

The silence lasts a few moments more before Andrew snorts suddenly, hard enough to propel his entire body forward. “You need to get a better sense of humor, Day,” He says. “But fine. Exy it is.”

Nicky doesn’t come back for a few days, caught up in legalwork. The Minyards have to be talked out of going after him the minute the team trudges back in the evening looking exhausted and pained. Neil tells Andrew gently that Nicky specifically asked for them to not come along, and only doesn’t get punched in the face for it because he’s Neil.

But regardless of Neil’s frankly impossible negotiation skills, Kevin overhears Nicky on speakerphone the next day while coming out of the bathroom, snapping at the twins to stay at home and let him fucking take care of it once. Kevin takes one look at their faces and flees and Neil and Katelyn, standing outside the room, take one look at his face and practically run inside.

Everyone is increasingly on edge the longer Nicky doesn’t come back, practice becoming so aggressive that Abby uses her nurse card to force a vacation on them, which only worsens matters as the one outlet for their emotions is taken away. 

Kevin catches Matt and Dan’s eyes sometimes and remembers the fire, and it usually makes him gravitate closer and start up a conversation. They don’t want to risk talking about it aloud, because they hadn’t thought to put in a false lead in place to divert suspicion from their group, but they find other things to chat about and Matt orders lighters that match Kevin’s for Dan and himself, and Kevin smiles whenever he sees them.

Nicky comes back in funeral clothes on day five without warning anyone, and stumbles past a shocked Kevin and shuts himself in his room for ten hours straight. Neil, who was the only one keeping up with the proceedings and driving back and forth every day to help Nicky- Kevin thinks it’s a mixture of Neil being a promise-breaker and unable to take no for an answer and some leftover mafia blackmail that allows him on-site- tells them later that since none of the other people in the house had any other family, the police had asked Nicky to conduct their funerals as well, and then gave him their property as recompense. 

Kevin’s pretty sure that last part wasn't legal, but Neil only shrugged and said that one of the officers felt bad for the fact that they lost their case and the others were only too happy to not do any paperwork. 

But that meant Nicky was gone for another week, sorting out everything and selling and investing and doing financial stuff that Kevin didn’t bother following. Instead he kept his mouth shut and very forcibly stopped himself from panicking about the lack of practice and tried to help Dan sooth over all the fights that broke out.

And then finally Nicky comes down one day with a bounce in his step and a smile on his face and wearing an eyesore of a pride t-shirt and everyone smiles as he calls out a hello. 

“And how are my favorite cousins?” He sings out as he walks over to them and squeezes them hard enough Kevin hears something pop from the other side of the room. Andrew and Aaron look too relieved to complain, even when Nicky starts chattering about something loudly right next to their ears. 

He and Neil race each other to Foxhole ten minutes later, pent up from the lack of playing and ready to get back to the court. Life is good.

“Can you all please just shut up?” Kevin moans a month later, head in his hands.

“It’s a practical question, Kevin,” Andrew drawls, Neil snickering next to him. “It’s for the good of the team . You’re always pushing us all to be the best versions of ourselves on the team , right?”

“Yeah, Kev,” Dan shoves at his shoulder, holding back laughter. “As your captain, I need to know whether your puppy love crush is going to be a tactical disadvantage on the exy court.”

“You tripped,” Allison is practically howling on the floor with laughter. It’s been ten minutes, for fuck’s sake. “All that hard work and practice and you trip over your own feet like a lovesick idiot when faced with your crush.”

“I don’t have a-” Kevin tries to protest, but Neil cuts him off.

“Oh, no, it was better than that,” He grins. “Kevin didn’t trip over his feet and bash his head into the floor because of that. He embarrassed us all because- drumroll please?” Aaron obligingly stops taking videos of Kevin falling from different angles to beat out a drumroll against the coffee table. Neil looks dramatically at the rest of the team and says, “He fell because Jeremy smiled at him.”

“Scandalous!” Renee gasps.

“Are you serious?” Andrew demands. “Kevin, tell me he’s joking. Kevin, look me in the eyes and tell me you weren’t actually out there swooning over a smile.”

“Aw, you are so cute!” Nicky coos, squishing Kevin’s cheeks together. “Baby’s first gay experience! I’m so happy for you!”

“That’s really cute,” Matt grins, knocking their shoulders together, “Are you gonna ask him out?”

“It’s fucking embarrassing, is what it is,” Aaron says, “Y’all gave me so much shit for mooning over Katelyn, but at least I never dragged the whole fucking team to bumfuck nowhere just so I could stutter over my words like a twelve year old schoolgirl.”

“Hey, leave him alone!” Nicky exclaims, pulling Kevin into his side protectively. “Let Kevin have his first gay experience in peace! Ah, young love,” He sighs happily, “Do you want advice on how to deal with it? A wingman? Condoms? Jeremy looks like he swings our way, which is great news for you, if you can manage talking to him without busting your face up.”

Kevin groans and sinks further into his seat, slinging a hand over his eyes. He’s so embarrassed about the whole thing he almost misses when Neil suddenly pipes up. “Yo, Nicky, what happened to your parent’s jewelry? It’s not on your necklace- did it fall during the game?”

“Oh, no, I removed them,” Nicky smiles, “They weren’t- They don’t deserve a place on the necklace. I don’t want them there.”

Kevin freezes in place as Nicky gets up and walks out the door, saying something about calling coach, like everyone isn’t staring at him and his very conspicuously bone-free necklace as he goes, and winces as he watches the misunderstanding blooming in the twin's eyes. Andrew shoots to his feet and makes to get away as soon as the door slings closed and Aaron goes for the alcohol and takes a long gulp.

“Wait!” Matt shouts, stumbling to his feet and grabbing Andrew by the hand and wrestling him away from the door. “Wait, it’s not what you think!”

“GET OFF ME!” Andrew bellows, “Get off!”

“Andrew, wait,” Kevin jumps up in front of him to block his exit, even as Matt lets go and backs away. “Look, just, wait here, okay? There’s something-” He looks to Matt and Dan, who nod at him. “Just wait here.”

Kevin sprints to the lockers and pulls out the charred bones from his sock, making a mess of his bag, thanking his past self for having the foresight to carry them around with him. He runs all the way back, hesitating for a few seconds in front of the door before cursing and walking in anyway.

Andrew immediately turns his glare on Kevin when he walks in, Aaron avoiding his gaze in contrast right until he comes to a stop in front of them. He holds out the twin bones and their eyes widen as Kevin delicately places them in their palms.

Andrew’s hand shoots out to grab Kevin’s, staring intensely at the burnt fossil, and he full-body flinches, heart skipping several beats. 

“Andrew, hand!” Renee says sharply and Andrew tears his gaze away from the bone to see Kevin’s terrified face and everyone moving forward to separate them and lets go immediately.

“Sorry,” he says bluntly, carefully placing a hand on Kevin’s other shoulder. Kevin breathes in to calm his jackrabbiting heart down, trying not to tremble. Riko’s face flashes in front of his eyes, and he tells himself Andrew would never hurt him. He trusts him. 

You trusted Riko too, his mind hisses. And Andrew did hurt you, remember?

Kevin slowly pulls away from Andrew and pretends not to see Neil’s wince and the flash of hurt in Andrew’s eyes before they go blank. He jerks a nod in acceptance and says in a voice too steady to be calm, “Kevin. Why do you have these?” 

“Why are they burnt?” Aaron adds, voice strained.

Kevin looks over his shoulder for help and Matt and Dan sigh and step forward.

“Come on, you’re not stupid,” Matt says quietly. “Nicky isn’t a quiet crier and the walls back home are thin.”

“No,” Neil says, getting it first but shaking his head in denial. "Nicky? No- that- no!"

"Dan hotwired us a car there and back," Kevin says and Renee sits down heavily on the floor, Allison next to her. "We made sure no one else would get hurt."

"What the fuck," Aaron says. "This isn't fucking funny, Day, stop joking around."

"He's not," Dan says. "It's half an hour from here to there when the roads are empty. We left fifteen minutes after Nicky got the call."

"You took the gasoline from the janitor's room in the main building, didn't you?" Allison murmurs, clapping a hand over their mouth, "They're still searching for it."

Kevin curses, "Goddamit Matt, I told you there wouldn't be gasoline just lying around, but you don't listen to me, do you?"

Matt shrugs, "We'll just buy some and leave it somewhere for the college to find. Problem solved."

"Wait, can we please go back to the matter at hand," Neil says, waving his hands at them. "You're saying that Nicky- Nicky- killed his own parents?"

"Tone back the judgement, Butcher Boy," Dan frowns at him, "You've killed people too."

"Exactly!" Neil waves his arms about. "Why didn't you guys call me?"

"You'd immediately tell Andrew."

"You've already been through enough in your life."

"You are nineteen. You are a child."

Neil sputters indignantly, and Kevin bites back a smile at it. 

Aaron interrupts, "Why would- Why the fuck would Nicky do that?"

"Hey, we helped too," Matt says, offended. 

"Exactly!" Aaron snaps, bristling up further agitatedly. "Why the fuck would you all kill Nicky's parents?"

"Because they were monsters, Aaron," Dan snaps. "Because they hurt Andrew, and they let people hurt you, and they hurt Nicky more than he ever fucking lets on."

"So you kill them?"

"You and Andrew have killed for each other before, why can't we?" Kevin demands, putting his hands on his hips. "Why can't Nicky kill for you?"

Andrew speaks up for the first time in a while. "It's not the fucking same, Kevin."

"Don't give me that shit," Kevin growls in his face. "What, we're not related, so we're not allowed to care about you? You can protect the whole team against the fucking Yakuza with not so much as a gun to your name, and we can't protect you back? Why, Andrew?"

"Because it happened fucking years ago!" Andrew shouts, getting to his feet. "It's not worth killing people over!"

"No, you don't think you're worth killing people over!" Kevin shouts back louder. "You don't think you're worthy of being loved!"

The room is silent when his echo fades out and Andrew actually takes a step back at that one, shock coloring his features, blinking hard. "Fuck, Queen," He chokes out, "Not holding back, are you?"

"Yeah, Kevin, jeez," Allison says, stepping forward, placing a palm on Andrew's shoulder until he looks at her. "And you are, by the way. Loved."

Andrew's mouth works for a bit but in the end, he forces out, "Thanks, Allison."

"You don't thank people for loving you, idiot," Aaron mutters from under them. He's crying silently, thumb rubbing over the bone in his hand. "You just love them back."

"Wow, Katelyn is good for you," Andrew snaps down at him, voice thick, and Aaron huffs and shoves him. But they both don’t actually look angry, just overwhelmed, and Kevin relaxes a bit. 

Andrew sees him do it and pulls out the most disgusted expression he has. "You're stupid," He says, sneering at him before nearly crushing Kevin's ribs and lungs with strength that someone so small really shouldn't possess. "And I hate you. All of you."

"Yeah, yeah," Dan says, accepting the hug with a grin. "We don't regret it."

Andrew hugs Matt- although 'hug' is an extremely generous word for the body slamming he's doing- and then the door swings open and Nicky walks in. 

"Guess what? Coach said-" The cheerfulness bleeds out of his expression when he looks around at the stares the team are giving him, gaze landing on the bones clutched tight in the twins' hands. 

Nicky clicks his tongue, narrowing his eyes at Kevin, unimpressed. "Really?" He says. "Did you have to?"

Andrew shoots across the room and shoves Nicky into the wall before any of them have time to cry out. Kevin moves towards them with everyone else, but pauses when he sees that Andrew isn't doing anything, just standing there with both fists twisted in Nicky's shirt. 

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" He demands, voice mangled. "Are you fucking insane? Why would you do that?"

Nicky sighs. "You're family, Andrew. That's why."

Andrew curls his fists tighter. “We already know that, idiot. You didn’t- need to-” His voice gives out and he drops his head into Nicky’s shirt, hands shaking.

Aaron steps closer and demands fiercely, "If we mean so fucking much to you, then why did you throw our bones into a fucking fire?"

"What?” Nicky frowns. “I wanted to- to start listening to you two more. You complain about the bones so often, I thought- fucking- ANDREW, THAT FUCKING HURT!"

"JUST SHUT UP, YOU STUPID MOTHERFUCKER!" Andrew shouts in his face, and Aaron rushes forward into them and crushes Nicky against the wall so hard it has to hurt, followed almost immediately by Andrew. Nicky stares down at them with his mouth wide open, eyes wide and surprised and shocked. The arms around him tighten and Nicky softens, carefully placing his hands on their backs and giving them time to pull away before hugging them back.

Kevin smiles at them, huffing a teary laugh when Nicky starts bawling at the top of his lungs and clutches his brothers closer and the others scramble for their phones and start clicking away wildly, whooping with joy. 

“What’s happening? Why aren’t you all out on the field yet?” Dad enters the waiting room with a scowl. He looks around at all of them, doing a double take when he spots the cousins hugging. “Do I even want to know?”

"We're officially all murderers!" Matt calls out cheerfully and Renee chokes on her laughter. "Petition to change our team name to Bloody Foxes!"

Several people start yelling at him and Kevin laughs as Dad stands there for a moment and processes that and then just sighs and walks back out of the room to extend their half-time. The Minyard-Hemmick fusion dissolves and spreads out across the room and Kevin reaches out with his left hand and squeezes Andrew's wrist when he walks by. 

Andrew stops immediately and looks back at him, then at his hand. "Sorry," He says quietly under the noise, leaning on the wall next to Kevin. "For hurting you. I promise I will never do it again." 

Kevin smiles and shrugs. "Can't blame you. Musn't have been easy to find out that the person you were in love with was a mob boss's son and about to be killed."

Andrew snorts, watching as Aaron wheezes in Matt's grip. "I wanted to slap the fucking shit out of him when you told me. Wait- I'm not-" He glares at Kevin, who snickers at him. "Fuck off, Day."

"We have eyes, you know," Kevin says. "And I forgive you, but I- I'll need a while."

"Fair enough," Andrew says. After a pause, "How did you do it?"

Kevin tells him his version of the story while Matt and Dan do the same with much more emphasis and hand gestures and embellishments for the other. He doesn't think he spent much time going into how much of an absolute blast the whole thing was, but when he finishes Andrew is staring at him with incredulous resignation. 

"Arson, Queen? Really?" Andrew looks like he's praying for someone to put him out of his misery. "That's the hobby you choose to obsess over next? Arson?"

"I didn't even say anything about the fire!" Kevin protests and Andrew slowly drops his head into his hands and groans. "It's- it's really fun, you should try it sometime."

"Already have," Andrew replies airily and Kevin knocks their shoulders together. 

"The setting fire to stuff part, asshole," Kevin says and Andrew smiles close-mouthed at him. "Equal to at least three sessions with Bee."

The blond raises an eyebrow, interested. “We’ll try it the next time we get bored.”  They look at Neil as he throws himself between them with a grin and Andrew frowns. “You won’t be coming with us.”

“Aw,” Neil pouts- pouts ; Kevin can’t believe this is the same terrified boy from a year ago- “Where won’t I be coming along? Why do you have to be so mean to me, babe?”

“With us when we go indulge Kevin’s newfound passion for arson,” Andrew replies after smacking him for the petname, and Neil ignores the violence and shoots Kevin a look of impressed caution. “Which you are staying away from, honeybuns , we don’t need two of you on the team.”

Neil purrs something to him in German that makes Andrew go tomato-red and Kevin quickly makes the executive decision to get the fuck out of there. “Coach is calling,” He informs them even though Coach isn’t even in the room, and speedwalks away from them before they switch to a language he knows and scar him for life.

Turns out, Dad really is standing on the other side of the door Kevin flees out of. They stare at each other for a moment before Coach sighs and jerks his head towards the court. Kevin follows him, waiting for a reaction. They’re still settling into a new dynamic, and he doesn’t really know what to expect.

“So you lot set those fires, huh?” Dad says finally, voice unreadable. “To get revenge.”

“Yeah,” Kevin admits. “Me, Matt, Dan and Nicky.”

“Really, Kevin?” Dad sighs as they walk down the hall. Kevin shrugs defensively. Wymack sighs again and drags a hand down his face before slinging an arm around his shoulder. “Good job.”

Kevin smiles. They reach the court and pause, Dad turning to look at him with amusement, smirking a bit. “I assume that Nicky will have the gay sex talk covered, so I won’t bother,” He says conversationally and Kevin chokes on his spit, ears and cheeks going bright red. “Jeremy’s a sweet guy. He’ll be good for you.”

“Um-” Kevin says helplessly.

“Of course, that may be just the gratitude for the stunt he pulled last year talking,” Dad muses as Kevin buries his face in his hands and whimpers. He wishes he would hurry up and pass out from embarrassment so he doesn’t have to hear his father vetting Jeremy Knox like Kevin’s a young maiden from the Victorian era being presented for her first season. “But then again, you did say you two were friends even when you were stuck at Evermore. And he actively seeks out your ranting as well, which is highly promising.”

“Please stop,” Kevin begs. The Trojans are out on the field and fooling around while waiting for the Foxes, and Jeremy’s laughter ringing out only makes him blush harder. “We’re just friends.”

“Friends smiling at you don’t make you smash your face into the ground,” Coach says dryly and Kevin makes an animal sound of mortification, curling down against the railing and wishing he could disappear. “And the only thing that makes you smile as easily as he does is Exy.”

“I’m going to die,” Kevin declares and Dad snorts and smacks him on the back. 

“Don’t. You’re at the age where you should fool around and have fun. Go get him, tiger,” he says, moving away. “Thanks for agreeing to wait, Jeremy.”

“No problem, Coach,” Jeremy says cheerfully and Kevin shoots up to see all 5’3 of human sunshine walking into the bleachers and standing next to him. “Family emergencies take precedence. Everything alright?”

He directs this last part to Kevin, sparkling hazel eyes concerned and so fucking kind, and Kevin swallows and tries to make his brain spit out something coherent. “Yeah! Yeah, we- we’ll need another twenty minutes, but we should be fine.”

Jeremy relaxes. “Good.” He looks to the side and Kevin follows his gaze- his team seems to  have gone inside when Kevin wasn’t looking, and Coach is probably yelling at the Foxes right now, which means the two of them are alone in the rundown Exy court between their cities that they’ve met up in to practice. Kevin’s breath hitches as he registers it and turns to Jeremy sharply. 

Jeremy’s already looking at him when Kevin turns, watching the realization passing over Kevin’s face with satisfaction, eyes dark and intense. Kevin gulps, heartrate and breathing speeding up and face going even more scarlet as Jeremy smirks, confident and seductive and pleased, and slowly steps closer until he’s backed Kevin against the plexiglass without actually touching him, the distance between them burning across his skin. 

What all the Foxes insisting that Kevin should tell Jeremy that he’s absolutely stupid over him and all the Trojans gently dropping hints that Jeremy wouldn’t mind Kevin asking him out and all the tabloids taking more and more pictures for speculative articles that the team pointedly keep sticking on the Foxhole Court locker room notice board don’t know is that Jeremy has been aware of Kevin’s bumbling attraction to him this whole time.

“You hit the ground hard out there, pretty boy,” Jeremy says mischievously, and Kevin lets out a strangled noise as his brain turns to a puddle of happy goo mindlessly repeating pretty boy pretty boy, pretty boy back to him. It’s what Jeremy had said to him out on court during their game, whispering ‘nice catch there, pretty boy’ too low for anyone else to hear, which had been what actually led to Kevin tripping over himself and falling flat on his face. “All good?”

“Mhm,” Kevin manages, nodding and Jeremy hums in satisfaction as he reaches up and tucks a stray lock of hair away from Kevin’s eyes and behind his ear. Kevin tries to remember to breathe and manages to say, "Great."

"Just like your playing," Jeremy beams, the corner of his eyes crinkling with the force of it, and can someone send help, how the fuck is he supposed to function like a normal person in the face of all of this . Jeremy tilts his head, caramel curls falling into his face, and reaches out to rub a gentle thumb against Kevin's tattoo. "Nasty bruise you got out of it, though. Want me to kiss it better?"

"Ngfk," Kevin replies, barely managing to keep his agreement to a quick nod rather than the begging on his knees for it he feels like doing. Jeremy giggles at him and presses closer, their bodies joined from knees to collarbones, his other hand curling around Kevin’s neck and messing up his hair from behind. “You sure?” He says flirtatiously, “

 He stops tracing Kevin’s cheekbones and crooks a finger enticingly at him, smiling. “Come here, queen.”

Kevin shivers and leans down, heart thundering away in his chest. Jeremy leans up until their lips are millimetres apart and pauses there for an infinitesimal second, hot breath on Kevin’s skin, before his lips quirk and he twists his head to kiss the bruise blooming over Kevin’s tattooed cheek. He stays there, warm lips pressing softly against Kevin’s cheek, keeping Kevin bent down by the gentle hand behind his neck, kissing him right there in the empty Exy bleachers with the hot afternoon sun beating down upon them through the open roof, holding him like he’s something delicate and precious.

Kevin thinks he’s flatlining when Jeremy slowly pulls back, lips brushing along the curve of his cheekbone before moving away, so beyond shock and happiness and nervousness that he thinks he’s already reached heaven. Jeremy barks out a sharp laugh as he sweeps his gaze over Kevin’s tomato-red, flushed and stunned face, shaking his head fondly. 

“See you on the court, Kev,” Jeremy grins, running his palms down Kevin’s arms before stepping away and running off to his team. Kevin stares at him and his bonfire-warm smile as he turns to run backwards so he can stare at Kevin before disappearing, and collapses shakily onto the bench behind him.

He laughs once, happiness burning in his chest, and tips his head back into the sunfire pouring down on him. He’s free, and happy, and content and perhaps just a little in love. Life’s good.